Gematria

The Pseudo Science of Arithmology

by

Tami Vincent

Gulf Coast Community College

March 2000

Gematria, or arithmology, is the belief that various writings, especially religious scriptures, contain secret messages that can be discovered through translating various writings into numbers.  Gematria is a system in which hidden meanings are revealed within words. In early languages, especially Hebrew and Greek, each letter of the alphabet corresponded to a number.  Therefore, the letters for words could also be read as numbers, which translated entire phrases, sentences, and paragraphs into writings that contained additional meaning.  Numerical values of words are totaled up and then these words are said to correspond with other words sharing the same numerical value. The earliest recorded use of gematria was by the Babylonian King Sargon II who, in the eighth century B.C., built the wall of Khorsabad exactly 16,283 cubits long because that was the numerical value of his name (Clawson, 48).   

Those who use Gematria generally believe that God gave humans the Hebrew and Greek languages with this double use, and then wrote the scriptures in such a way that the number values of words would then have meaning in addition to the obvious message conveyed through the written document.  Therefore, God inserted secret meaning into the Bible that can only be discovered through gematria (Clawson, 48).  For example, in the Greek alphabet, with its associated number values using addition, combining the letters of the word Jesus equals 888.  Through the use of gematria in early Christianity the dove became a representation of Jesus since the Greek word for dove, peristera, equals 801.  In addition the Greek letters in alpha and omega equal 801, and represent the Beginning and the End (Gematria-Mathematics and the Liberal Arts). 

The ancient Hebrews during the Middle Ages used a deviation of gematria called “Beasting.”  In the Revelation 13:18 we discover:

Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred threescore and six.

From this, Biblical scholars took the number of the devil to be 666.  In this period of history if it were possible to find a combination of letters in your enemy’s name, that added, through Gematria, to be 666, then your enemy would be discredited.

Beasting attacks were made against a number of powerful individuals, including the Popes of Rome (Clawson, 50). 

Most of us are aware of the phenomenon of the “lucky number seven”, which may originate from the first verse of the Bible (Genesis 1:1).  “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  In Hebrew, this verse has 7 words and 28 (7 x 4) letters.  Therefore, through the use of gematria, the number seven has become associated with completeness and perfection.  The number itself is repeated throughout the Bible both in the Hebrew Old Testament, and in the Greek New Testament.  

For example, there are 7 feasts of Israel, 7 lamps of the Menorah, 7 trumpets, 7 churches; seals, horns, eyes, and crowns, etc. (Hines, 1).  Multiple examples of the number 7 can be found in Bible rituals as well, such as “on the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times,” and lets not forget, that according to the scriptures, God created the earth in six days and rested on the seventh (Clawson, 41).

Ivan Panin, who has written over 42,000 pages of gematria notes about the Bible, found over 50 multiples of seven in the first verse of the scriptures, Genesis 1:1. The total gematria value for all seven words is 2701 (37 x 73).  In adding the 7 Hebrew words of Genesis 1:1 in different combinations, one will find 23 multiples of the number 37. 

Interestingly the number 37 as a star number takes on the shape of The Star of David. As if the complexity of encoding over fifty 7’s and twenty-three 37’s into the first seven words of Geneses 1:1 alone were not enough, Panin feels that God has also encoded both two and three-dimensional geometrical shapes into this first verse of the Bible since the words will produce statistically significant numbers of figurate polygons and platonic solids.  It is believed that through mathematical methods God has given us the exact measurements for the Tabernacle, and precise specifications for garments that the Levite priests wore (Hines, 2).  It is fascinating that the first verse of the Bible alone could contain so many hidden meanings, and amazing that examples such as those found in the first 7 words of the scriptures are found throughout the Bible.

      Further observations about the Bible include that if a number is mentioned on the surface of the text, you can also find the same number under the surface.  For instance, in John 21:11, Christ’s disciples caught 153 fish.  Various words associated with fishing, through gematria, are also divisible by 153.  “Fishes” has a value of 153 x 8, and “the net” has the same 153 x 8 value.  “Multitude of fishes” is 153 x 16, “fishers of men” is 153 x 14, and “casting a net into the sea” is 153 x 20 (Hines, 6).  

     A connection between Gematria and Pythagorean numerology also exists from the ancient Pythagorean doctrine that numbers act both as a blueprint for material existence and that they are the actual constitutes of matter.  Pythagoras, from the Greek island of Samos, (580-500 B.C.)  believed that numbers were not only objects of thought, but were also the building blocks of all reality. From this discovery it was concluded that all

material objects in the universe were resulting from the nature of number.  Numbers were like atoms, combining to form everything else. 

Evidently, then, these thinkers [Pythagoreans] also consider that number is the principle both as matter for things and as forming both their modifications and their permanent states…   (The basic works of Aristotle, trans. J. Annas)

The idea of number being a generator or prime factor of everything became a hallmark of Pythagorean beliefs (Clawson, 23). The names of Greek God’s were formulated using gematria. For example, Zeus is the Geometric Mean of Hermes and Apollo.  It is believed that many official buildings and Greek temples such as the Parthenon (447 BCE) and Apollo’s temple at Didyma (300 BCE) were constructed with the use of gematria (Opsopaus, par.2).  The term “gematria” comes from the Greek word “geometria,” meaning “earth measures”, from which our English term “geometry” originates (Hines, 3).

It was the 13^th century Kabbalists, however, who seriously studied gematria and developed it into an art form.  They seriously believed that the Old Testament was written in a hidden code inspired by God.  Gematria was one of the chief means by which they deciphered this code.  One example is shown in their interpretation of Jeremiah 9:9, which states, “From the foul of the heavens until the beasts are fled and gone” was interpreted to meaning that no traveler passed through Judea for 52 years, since the Hebrew word for beast, behemah, has the numerical value of 52.  Entire verses of the Old Testament were numerically added up and interpreted in the same fashion and the German Kabbalistic scholar, Eleazar of Worms, did extensive gematric commentaries on the Bible.  Two schools of thought regarding gematria were formulated from the Kabbalists.  One advocated its use while the other cautioned against its practice, recommending that it only be used to strengthen ones own conclusions.  Many present-day magicians have adopted Kabbalist beliefs and procedures.

Even today some small groups of people believe in ancient notions, which we find in the practices of numerology, the occult practice of decoding names and birthdays into numbers, and in the psuedo science of Gematria.  While it is interesting to study the relationship between numbers associated with words and the various ideas expressed within the Bible, gematria is not considered a true science because it does not give us the necessary tools for making meaningful predictions about our world.  All established sciences use recognized procedures to create a hypothesis, which can be proven or disproved by principles of independent verification. 

While gematria is discounted by modern science and considered unproductive, the basic impulse, which attracts us to its study, is the same impulse that attracts us to science and applied mathematics.  Current research is being conducted on the Bible via computer software that is possibly proving that the entirety of our world events both past, present and future are written within the scriptures. Through the development and use of computer software, names such as Kennedy are found in the Bible and remarkably enough, the words “to die” and “Dallas” are directly next to the former presidents name (Drosnin, 108).  If mathematical models imitate physical reality, is it too far of a stretch to say that physical reality is imitating mathematics? 

References

Clawson, Clarence. Mathematical Mysteries:  The Beauty and Magic of Numbers.

     New York and London:  Plenum Press, 1996.

Drosnin, Michael. The Bible Code. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997.

Hines, Mark. “Gematria.” Evidence of God. 28 May 1997.

     http://www.ortk.org/gematria.htm (10 Feb. 2000).

Mathematics and the Liberal Arts. Gematria.

     http://www.math.truman.edu/~thanmmond/history/gematria.html (12 Mar. 2000).

Opsopaus, John. “Some Notes on the History of Isopsephia.” Gematria. 17 Jun. 1997.

     http://www.cs.utk.edu/~mclennan/BA/SNHIG.html (10 Feb. 2000).

Panin, Ivan. “The Inspiration of the Scriptures Scientifically Demonstrated.” Biblical

     Numerics. http://www.trf.org.au/sunlttr.htm (15 Feb. 2000).